Pumping up a non issues, while ignoring the real story, has to become a predictable pattern with the mainstream media.

It is so extreme it is almost laughable, but not one bit funny to see it happen because our precarious freedoms rely very much on a free press.

It doesn't matter which side of the political aisle happens to be in the crossfire.

Whether it is Senator Larry Craig's wide stance in the bathroom overshadowing the 5,000 White House missing e-mails or Obama's trip overseas, replacing hearings about falsified pre-war intelligence and Executive crimes as political news.

What we get is all sizzle and no steak, an ounce of facade obscuring a pound of substance. This swill filled, MSM content was what drove many of us to seek refuge in cyberspace to begin with.

It was a thirst for the real stories and those of us more committed to the truth than the income that built Newsvine. It is more of the same hype that snubs not only the troops, but the public.

Sadly the sellout to MSNBC has flooded us with so much of the worthless talking head nonsense, it is hard to find the really worthwhile stories, even here, with rare exception.

Heaven knows the meat of what matters won't be on list of top stories, where new users with twenty votes and three hundred comments, including one comment by the person doing the seeding, dominates the line up for readers to choose from.

So todays sizzler is that Obama snubbed the troops. In truth, the story of Obama skipping a visit to the wounded is one where he would be dammed if he did and dammed if he didn't.

It has little to do with what either campaign is doing or what is happening in the Capitol or the World. This is not about choosing sides, but about choosing stories to dominate the headlines.

As we saw from CBS last week, it's even possible to change the story by editing, when facts get in the way of what you want the report to be.

This is a flag pin equivalent, where the truth about treatment of the troops and the fixed intelligence that led them to be in a place where they were in harms way takes a back seat to some passing point of brain numbing nothingness.

The real stories that should be the focus is that we are approaching a Presidential election where there is clear evidence of vote tampering that changed the outcome of the election that put George Bush in the White House.

That's not to suggest that a different individual in the Oval Office would have made all the difference in the world.

Two Bonesmen on the ticket is almost identical evils in my view. Neither party is much better than the other in terms of cronyism, corruption and corporate support over public service.

A few individuals on each side stand out as honorable public servants; the two parties themselves have shown their collective efforts in the messes we have now.

But to claim we have a Democracy with a free press and free elections is pure hypocrisy when the election fraud isn't part of the focus of the run up to the elections.

Nor are the crimes committed since the fraudulent installation of America's newest CEO who has served the interests of Wall Street at the expense of Main Street.

Let's look again at these troops who were supposedly snubbed and measure the degree of suffering and support through a lens other than that of the overpaid talking heads that shape the news.

In November of 2007 it was reported by the Homelessness Research Institute that more than 25% of the homeless population in America is made up of military veterans. It is enough of a disgrace that we have the growing population we do for the wealth in America. I

t is a reflection of a political system of corruption and lip service that the homeless ranks are filled with a disproportionate number of veterans. They tell us what the party values are, but actions speak louder than words and the results are undeniable and unforgivable.

According to a CNN article, one of many at the time, these homeless veterans are trained, skilled and theoretically highly employable. In terms of basic qualifications for employment they should have stable, well paying jobs, but they don't. They are on the streets, sleeping without any of the comforts of the lifestyle they risked their lives to defend.

On any given night last year, nearly 196,000 veterans slept on the street, in a shelter or in transitional housing, the study by the Homelessness Research Institute found.

"Veterans make up a disproportionate share of homeless people," the report said. "This is true despite the fact that veterans are better educated, more likely to be employed and have a lower poverty rate than the general population."

The president of the institute's parent group appealed Thursday to lawmakers and civilians to help solve veteran homelessness before thousands of U.S. service members return from Iraq and Afghanistan.

"We know that veterans don't immediately become homeless after they're discharged, but the difficulties may take years to emerge," Nan Roman, president of the National Alliance to End Homelessness, said in a news conference about the report's findings.

That's not a snub it is criminal negligence. Not only have those who fought returned broken on the inside, there are countless others whose wounds leave them physically maimed as well. What support have they had? Where is the patriotic support of their government?

Look no further than the revolving door between public office and Wall Street, which allows those who evoke themes of patriotism to pocket the largess of Congress in pork filled contracts, while soldiers do without.

The unemployed Veterans can share support with the wounded at the fetid and crumbling Walter Reed, in support of Bush's former Treasury Secretary John Snow. While Snow's leadership and policies for America were helping to add to our economic collapse, declining dollar and war funding, his personal fortunes were soaring as one of the many esteemed members of the Board of Directors of IAP Worldwide.

IAP Worldwide was a beneficiary of the promotion of smaller government that outsourced to friends of Washington the services previously done by Federal employees. They are the contractor who bled dry the services at Walter Reed where returning wounded go for rehabilitation and therapy.

From Dana Priest and Anne Hull at the Washington Post - February 18, 2007

Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The common perception of Walter Reed is of a surgical hospital that shines as the crown jewel of military medicine. But 5 1/2 years of sustained combat have transformed the venerable 113-acre institution into something else entirely -- a holding ground for physically and psychologically damaged outpatients. Almost 700 of them -- the majority soldiers, with some Marines -- have been released from hospital beds but still need treatment or are awaiting bureaucratic decisions before being discharged or returned to active duty.

They suffer from brain injuries, severed arms and legs, organ and back damage, and various degrees of post-traumatic stress. Their legions have grown so exponentially -- they outnumber hospital patients at Walter Reed 17 to 1 -- that they take up every available bed on post and spill into dozens of nearby hotels and apartments leased by the Army. The average stay is 10 months, but some have been stuck there for as long as two years.

Snow is not alone, former VP Dan Quayle is another Patriot who supports a luxurious lifestyle at the expense of caring for the ones who actually serve in uniform along with former General Michael Hagee and Gen. Michael P.C. Carns (Ret.), former Vice Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force; and Gen. George A. Joulwan (Ret.), former Commander in Chief, U.S. European Command and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe.

The very people who put these troops in harms way, toss them to the side in the interest of pocketing a little more income.

Though the Washington Post broke the story of Walter Reed's Building 18 well over a year ago, little has been done to challenge the claims of those who now hold the power in Washington. Those who claim time and again that their aim is to protect America and support the troops, do neither one.

The real snub is to all thinking people and defenders of freedom, by ignoring the crimes against America by those sworn to uphold the laws. What has been done to those who answered the call to serve is the worst crime of all. Thanks to corporate media the contracts will keep coming with the casualties of patriotism.